High Season

by Jon Loomis

  “Lawyers,” Kotowski said. “One step up the evolutionary ladder from real estate developers. Several steps below spirochetes, tapeworms, and dung beetles. You know what Shakespeare said, don’t you?”

  “Well, you still need one,” Coffin said. He stood outside Kotowski’s cell, leaning against the bars. “Mancini thinks you’re the next Tony Costa.”

  “Ha. I used to buy pot from Tony Costa. Very nice guy, as long as you weren’t an eighteen-year-old girl.”

  “Costa died in prison, you know.”

  “Okay, I’ll hire a lawyer. Whoever you recommend.”

  “Good. What else do you need?”

  “Socks, underwear, toothpaste, toothbrush, a carton of cigarettes, some whiskey, and lots of pornography. Thought you’d never ask.”

  Coffin laughed. “You’re only going to be here for a few hours, till they send somebody up from Barnstable to transport you.”

  “Okay, fine. Forget the socks and underwear.”

  “Anyone you want me to contact?”

  “No, but you’d probably better stop by my house now and then and feed Spaz.”

  Coffin rubbed his chin. He hadn’t shaved, and it was starting to get bristly. “Look,” he said, “I’m not going to let you rot down there. We’re going to find out who killed those people.”

  “Made a lot of progress, have you?”

  “Well, no.”

  “So I won’t hold my breath.”

  “Probably a good plan.”

  Kotowski waved a hand. “Hey, I did six months on Riker’s Island, I can sit in Barnstable County till my bail hearing.”

  “Riker’s, huh? Must have been tough.”

  “It’s a shithole. It’s out in the middle of the East River, you know—just downwind from this huge sewage treatment plant. God, it stank. Rats the size of schnauzers would pop up out of the toilets every now and then. One of my cellmates got bit on the sack and had to get a rabies shot.”

  “Jesus.”

  “But other than that it wasn’t so bad. We had wicked competitive games of Scrabble.”

  “Oh, come on now—”

  “No, seriously. A couple of those guys had memorized the entire Scrabble dictionary. They kicked ass.”

  Coffin rode Kotowski’s bike to the A&P and bought a toothbrush, a tube of toothpaste, and a carton of Camel filters. Next door, at Pete’s Liquor, he bought a half-pint bottle of scotch. Then he pedaled back to Town Hall and delivered the goods to Kotowski, producing the scotch from his pocket when he was sure no one was looking.

  “Thanks,” Kotowski said, cracking open the bottle. “But where the hell’s my porn?”

  “What would people think,” Coffin said, “if they saw me buying the latest issue of Twinks in Chains?”

  “They’d think you finally came to your senses,” Kotowski said, killing the whiskey in one long guzzle.

  Chapter 28

  Coffin was exhausted when he finally climbed off the bike and propped it against his front porch. There was a note from Jamie inside, on the kitchen counter:

  Wild Man,

  My stuff’s in the bedroom. How about clearing out a drawer or two, now that we’re roomies? Went to Orleans with Corrine to do laundry and buy fish, etc. Back by 8:00 or so.

  XO

  Jamie

  Coffin dropped ice cubes into a glass and poured two fingers of scotch. He stood by the sink and drank the scotch while a scrum of tiny brown ants pushed a small piece of potato chip across the counter. Outside the window, the sunflowers drooped in the hum of late-afternoon heat.

  When the scotch was gone, he refilled his glass, went into the living room, and sat down on his mother’s uncomfortable sofa. The answering machine blinked its red light at him from the end table.

  He pushed the button and skipped through messages from reporters: ABC, Fox News, Channel 7. Serena’s killing had been sensational; Louie’s had driven the press into a frenzy. Coffin erased all the messages. The stuffed goat’s head looked like it was about to say something insulting.

  Coffin took the bottle of scotch out to the screen porch and sat down in the big wicker chair. He sat there a long time, watching the light slant and turn golden, then suffuse with red. He sipped scotch and listened to the slow crescendo of crickets out in the lowering dusk; more and more of them every night. Fall was coming. Soon the tourist hordes would perform their disappearing act and go back to their lives in Boston or Providence or New York or wherever, taking their noise and sunburns and various appetites with them, and leave the town empty and dark through the long winter—though even that was changing, Coffin thought. Soon the off-season would be a thing of the past. It was already shrinking, starting later and ending sooner, becoming less defined thanks to a string of mild winters (global warming was just fine with the B and B owners) and a concerted effort on the part of the selectmen to lure visitors to town for the holidays, which, in Provincetown, included Christmas—marketed as something called Holly Folly—and New Year’s Eve, of course, and the long weekends of President’s Day and Martin Luther King Day, and, most commercially viable of all, Valentine’s Day. The growing popularity of telecommuting was a factor, too, as was all the new money generated by the high-tech boom and then the real estate boom. Twenty years ago, Labor Day had been like a movie about the Rapture that Coffin had seen once: The magic hour would strike, and suddenly Provincetown would be deserted, as though all the tourists had been sucked up to heaven by God’s giant Shop-Vac. Now they lingered and lingered, staying on for Women’s Week and Leather Week and Bears Week and Tall Ships Week (officially Fantasia Fair, though no one called it that). And then for weeks after that, until the truly dismal rain and dark of November set in, little squads of Europeans and retirees would clog the narrow sidewalks with their big butts and elastic waistbands while pointing out the harbor, the tethered boats along the wharf, the Pilgrim Monument, and Commercial Street’s hundred funky little shoppes (the Drag Strip, the Pleasure Chest, and, God help us, Poochie’s—Look at that! A bakery for dogs!) as if they were the first civilized people to have discovered them. Coffin was pouring a third glass of scotch when a black Camaro pulled up in front of his house and Lola got out.

  “Frank?” she said, peering in at him the way she might have looked at a grapefruit in the back of the fridge that had begun to liquefy. “You all right?”

  “Fantastic,” he said. “Want a drink?”

  “God, yes.” She opened the screen door and stepped onto the porch. She was wearing faded jeans with a small rip in the left knee, a black V-necked T-shirt, and black engineer boots. Her hair was pulled back in the usual ponytail. Coffin handed her the bottle. She took a swig, made a face, then took another swig. “Did we miss something, Frank?” she said.

  “No,” he said. “I don’t think so. Aside from not actually catching the killer, anyway.”

  Lola sat down on the porch swing; its chains creaked a little. “We’re not supposed to be working together anymore,” she said. “Boyle told me I’m back on my regular shift.”

  “Good. Breaking into Louie’s office is completely illegal. If we got caught, it’d end your career. I shouldn’t have asked you to come along.”

  Lola grinned. “I told him I needed a couple of days off. He said I deserved it.” She took another swig from the bottle of scotch. “You’re nuts if you think you’re breaking into Louie’s office without me, Frank,” she said.

  The moon was rising, egg shaped and off-balance in the violet sky. Coffin wondered if the coyotes were congregating in the cemetery, waiting for full dark to sing their feral song. He looked at his watch. Eight forty-five, and no Jamie.

  “There’s more bad news about your friend Kotowski,” Lola said, looking out into the gathering dark. “The state police found a .44 Magnum slug embedded in the ceiling of Louie’s car.”

  “Makes sense. You could have stuck your fist through the exit wound.”

  “They searched Kotowski’s house; there was a .44 Mag Colt Python in his closet.
They’re checking the ballistics first thing tomorrow.”

  Coffin groaned. “Planted. Mancini’s pulling out all the stops. A hundred to one, ballistics shows a perfect match.”

  They were silent for a few minutes. Coffin lit a cigarette. Then he said, “Do you think he did it?”

  Lola’s eyebrows drew together. “It’s not impossible,” she said, “even though he was with you the night of Duarte’s murder. He could’ve used some kind of timing device. Or there could be two killers.”

  “Why not four?” Coffin said. “One for each corpse.”

  “Why couldn’t there be two killers? Somebody saw an opportunity to settle a score, maybe, hoping the cops would assume all the murders were committed by the other guy. Maybe a copycat—somebody who wanted their fifteen minutes of fame.”

  “I just know Kotowski,” Coffin said. “He’s a crank, but he’s not psychotic—and I’ve met a lot of psychotics. It’s mostly instinct, I guess. I know how stupid that sounds.”

  Lola took a sip of whiskey from the bottle. “You hungry, Frank? Have you eaten anything?”

  “I could eat. You?”

  “Starving. What’s in the fridge?”

  “I think I have some cheese.”

  Lola stood and stretched. “Cheese,” she said. “Great.”

  She walked into the kitchen. Coffin followed, fighting the urge to stare at her backside.

  “There’s three kinds of mustard in here,” Lola said, peering into the fridge. “All about empty. A bottle of Bass Ale. And a scary little science project in the crisper. Look,” she said, pulling out a hunk of smoked Gouda in a Ziploc Bag, “actual food. And the pièce de résistance—a jar of olives.” She held the olives out triumphantly, then set them on the counter. “Sounds like dinner to me.”

  “There might be some Triscuits in the cupboard over the sink,” Coffin said, checking his watch. “Where the hell is she?”

  “She who? You expecting Jamie?”

  “She was supposed to be back by eight. She’s staying here for a while.”

  “Because of Plotz?” Lola said, putting the cheese and a handful of Triscuits on a plate.

  Coffin opened the olives and spooned them into a bowl. “Jamie thinks I’m being paranoid, but that shrine of his gave me the serious creeps.”

  Lola shrugged. “Not to mention that trying-to-squish-you thing.”

  “Wait,” Coffin said, when Lola sat down. “I just thought of something.” He opened the cupboard above the sink and rummaged in the back for a moment before producing a small, flat can. “Sardines,” he said. “In oil.”

  “Ew,” Lola said. “Nasty.”

  Coffin put the sardines back in the cupboard. “For Kotoswki’s cat,” he said.

  _______

  After they ate, Lola stood at the sink, rinsing her plate. “Am I crazy,” she said, “or is somebody sitting in a blue pickup truck across the street?”

  Coffin chewed an olive. “Plotz?” he said.

  “Maybe. Hard to tell from this distance. Who else?”

  “Let’s find out,” Coffin said. “You stay here—in front of the window, but don’t look out. Pretend you’re talking to me. I’m going out the back.”

  “Frank,” Lola said, “maybe you should take a weapon.”

  Coffin dug in the hall closet and pulled the Colt out of its shoe box. He made sure the safety was on and tucked the pistol into his waistband.

  “ ’Atta boy,” Lola said.

  Coffin slipped out the back door and circled the house, stepping through a weed-choked flowerbed. The yard hadn’t been mowed in weeks; the grass was tall and going to seed. The stars were bright little rends in the night sky, lamplight behind a moth-holed curtain.

  The man in the truck was slumped down, smoking a cigarette. As quietly as he could, Coffin duckwalked to the driver’s door from the rear, keeping low, out of view of the side mirror. He could see Lola clearly through the kitchen window, her back to the street. He slipped the Colt from his belt and stood up, holding the pistol down at his side.

  The man in the truck started, dropped his lit cigarette into his lap, fumbled, then recovered it. “Jesus Christ, Frankie,” he said. “You scared the fuck out of me.”

  “Hello, Rudy. I thought maybe you were someone else.”

  “That’s twice, you stealthy son of a bitch. You trying to give a guy a heart attack or what?”

  “You could knock on the door, like a normal person.”

  Uncle Rudy gestured at Coffin’s window. “I was waiting for Brunhilda to leave. Who’s she talking to in there, anyway?”

  “Nobody.” Coffin put the Colt back in his waistband and leaned against the truck. He waved to Lola. She waved back, then moved away from the window.

  “So, are you back?” Coffin said. “Or haven’t you left yet?”

  Rudy grinned. “You’re pissed,” he said. “Because of that stuff about Duarte and the drugs.”

  “Sure I’m pissed,” Coffin said. “I had to look at Dogfish without any pants on. And I had to ride in a boat with that maniac Teddy Goulet. Who wouldn’t be pissed?”

  “Of all the things to have a phobia about, you had to pick boats. The son of a fisherman. Your dad never got over it.”

  “Thanks for bringing that up,” Coffin said.

  “I was just trying to change the subject,” Rudy said. He took a flask from the glove compartment, drank from it, and offered it to Coffin. Coffin took a short sip, then another, longer swallow.

  “Bad about Louie,” Coffin said.

  “Real bad. I’d love to get my hands on the son of a bitch that shot him.”

  “Me, too. As opposed to the guy they arrested.”

  Rudy laughed, then coughed and spat out the window. “Guy keeps a sign in his yard for ten years that says Louie’s a son of a bitch. Then he goes and wallops him with a fish—not that Louie didn’t deserve it. Then a few days later, Louie shows up dead. Who do you think they’re going to arrest?”

  “They planted a gun in Kotowski’s house.”

  Rudy shrugged and took another drink from the flask. “Of course they did,” he said, wiping his sleeve across his mouth. “Juries like it when there’s evidence.”

  Coffin lit a cigarette. The smoke felt good in his lungs. “What was Louie up to, Rudy? What was he doing with a briefcase full of cash and a gun?”

  “Damned if I know,” Rudy said, “but you can bet your ass he was up to something.”

  Coffin turned and squinted at his uncle through a trail of cigarette smoke. “Where’s your gun, Rudy? You carry a Glock, right?”

  Rudy patted his jacket pocket. “Got it right here. Old Faithful.”

  “Let’s see it.”

  Rudy scowled. “What the fuck. You don’t believe me?”

  “Nope.”

  “God damn it, I told you it’s right here in my—” Rudy paused. He dug his big hand into his pocket. “Huh. I must’ve left it at Tony’s.”

  “Why did Louie need your gun, Rudy?” Coffin said. “Who was he afraid of?”

  Rudy snorted a laugh. “Hell—that’s easy. The same crazy motherfucker everybody else is afraid of. And for good reason, as it turns out. What a stupid-ass question.”

  “Rudy.” Coffin patted the big man’s cheek. “Louie’s dead. Whatever he was paying you to keep quiet about? He’s not going to pay you any more. Right?”

  Rudy snuffled. A single tear glistened on his cheek. He wiped it away. “I loved that little cocksucker like a brother,” Rudy said.

  Coffin nodded. “He was good people, considering what a slime-ball he was.”

  They were silent a little while. Then Coffin said, “So why don’t you help me catch the guy that killed him? We both know it wasn’t Kotowski.”

  Rudy emptied the flask and stuffed it back in the glove compartment. “You’re right,” he said. “Who am I protecting?”

  “Tell me abut REIC.”

  “They were working on a big real estate deal. The Project.”

  “
Kotowski’s house—is that it? What was Louie planning to do, tear it down and build condos?”

  “You’re thinking way too small.”

  Coffin stood in silence for a minute. The crickets sawed around him. The air smelled like night and fog. “Well, there’s the lot where the old A&P used to be—”

  “Keep going.”

  “There’s that swampy mess around Shank Painter Pond.”

  “And?”

  “Across the highway, off the Province Lands Road?”

  “You’re barely scratching the surface.”

  “Jesus,” Coffin said. “What else?”

  Rudy opened the truck door, swung his legs out. “You name it. Half the town. They had a list of the properties they were after as long as your arm.”

  “They? Who’s they? And where do I find this list?”

  “They is all the dead people. Merkin, Duarte, Hench, and Louie. They were all partners.”

  “That’s it? They’re all dead?”

  “Those are all the ones I know for sure, but I think there’s at least one more.”

  Coffin had to stop himself from grabbing Rudy by the lapels. “Okay,” he said. “Who’s the one more?”

  “That gay guy—the consultant. You know, the one with the great hair.”

  “Phipps? Jesus. That explains the attitude. What about this list—where do I find it?”

  “It’s in Louie’s office somewhere. But the real smoking gun is the tapes.”

  “You’re kidding me,” Coffin said. “There are tapes?”

  Rudy grinned. “Turns out Louie’s office has been bugged for a couple of years now. The system kind of reactivated itself when I got back to town. I haven’t listened to everything, but there’s some very interesting material on those tapes. You’re on a couple of them, too—funny stuff, Frankie.”